


Red

by Pholo



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: And there were only four beds, Bad spaceship food, Established Relationship, Flashbacks, Hurt/Comfort, Juno calls Nureyev 'hon' and no one can convince me otherwise, Other, Panic Attacks, a little bit of both really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:08:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24006370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pholo/pseuds/Pholo
Summary: When their new ship runs low on fuel, Buddy suggests the crew stop on Brahma.Nureyev doesn't react well.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 39
Kudos: 426





	Red

**Author's Note:**

  * For [onetiredboy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/onetiredboy/gifts).



> Okay, so Onetiredboy wrote [this AMAZING sequel to my daemons fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23536381) AND made [this FANTASTIC podfic for Apastron!!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23561908) And I was like "LET ME WRITE SOMETHING FOR YOU" and he was like "NO YOU DON'T HAVE TO" and I was like _"TELL ME WHAT TO WRITE OR I'LL STEAL ALL YOUR FURNITURE"_ and he was like "AAAAA" and was forced to produce a list of prompts lol. I picked the first prompt, where the gang ends up discussing Brahma over the dinner table and Juno finds Nureyev mid-panic attack afterward. It kind of evolved from there (whoops) sooooo I HOPE YOU LIKE THE FINAL RESULT, DUDE!
> 
> I wrote this fic with the verrrrry unlikely assumption that Nureyev's past won't be revealed at the Dark Matters base over the next two eps. Now THAT'S gonna' murder me.

The SP-A88 was the crew's “getaway car” after the mess with Dark Matters—the ship closest to the hangar bay doors as they made their escape. It contains two “bedrooms” with two cots each, a kitchen the size of a hairpin, and a single showerhead that spews lukewarm water like artillery fire. The night cycle lights are a garish neon red—something about wavelengths and night vision. There’s a whole room dedicated to weaponry, with guns so advanced that Juno can’t tell the magazines from the barrels.

It’s fast, cloaked, and about as comfortable as a metal shoebox. It's also very low on fuel.

“I’m afraid our dear friend the ‘A88’ was built for speed, not endurance,” Buddy says over dinner. It’s another night of ration mush. “We’ll need to stop soon to refuel.”

“Not a whole lot of options this far out,” Vespa muses. She’s been quieter since she got back—less like she’s scared to shout, maybe, and more like she doesn’t feel like she has to anymore.

“There are about to be even less,” Buddy says. “At this pace we’ll reach the Exlar Belt by Thursday. Once we enter that asteroid field we won’t have another chance to refuel for weeks.”

Nureyev looks up from his mush. “The Exlar Belt?”

Vespa spears a gray “vegetable” with her fork. “Problem, Ransom?”

“No, no,” Nureyev says. “I’m only surprised you would want to brave such treacherous terrain.”

“It is not optimal,” Jet agrees from across the table. “But with Dark Matters on our tail we cannot afford any delays. The Belt is the fastest route through the Hydleby system.”

Nureyev hums. “This close to the Exlar Belt, Brahma will be our most viable option for fuel, then?”

Juno chokes on his drink. Rita makes a shocked squawk and claps him on the back. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, Mista Steel!”

“Sorry,” Juno wheezes. He sets his glass down and scrubs a napkin over his mouth. “I’m fine—swallowed wrong.” He coughs. Rita thumps him on the back one more time for good measure. “Did you uh—did you say Brahma?”

“It is the closest planet to the Belt not gripped by civil war,” Jet explains. “There are no travel bans or trade embargoes to bar us from purchasing fuel quickly and with little governmental oversight.”

“That’s great and all, but aren’t there, you know—” Juno gestures grandly to the ceiling. “Laser beams that rain down from the sky and fry anybody who litters or something?”

“Oh, that’s ancient history, boss!” Rita says. “I saw this great docu series— _Angel in the Wires_. The Brahmese government turned off those lasers REAL quick when a big ol’ ANGEL showed up at their super top secret headquarters and ran off with their evil tech! But THEN this guy Alfred ran after her and the two of ‘em fell MADLY IN LOVE but the guards caught up to ‘em and Alfred took a BULLET for his true love! It was awful, Mista Steel. Can you pass the ration squares? Yeah, those funny things—so anyway with his dyin’ breath Alfred begged the angel to put the tech back together and the whole world was saved! And everybody was so broken up and grateful that they swore off killin’ forever and ever and they all lived happily ever after—but SADLY because Alfred was dead.”

“Or, in more technical terms, a system breach exposed the vulnerability of Brahma’s tyrannical elite.” Juno swears Buddy’s uncovered eye flicks to Nureyev. “It opened the doors to other saboteurs and freedom fighters, until at last the people of New Kinshasa were forced to meet certain demands to maintain their stature. The program you’re referring to, Juno, was cancelled over twenty years ago.”

“Oh!” Juno says. He wrinkles his napkin a bit between his fingers, mostly so that he doesn’t reach for Nureyev’s hand. “Good. That’s good.”

“Something you wanna’ share with the class, Steel?” Vespa asks.

“No, just…not caught up on my outer rim history, I guess.”

Buddy sets down her fork. “We’ll be docking on Brahma within the next two days—assuming none of you have any objections?”

“So long as we’ll be allowed to shop for food, I can't see why anyone would,” Nureyev says, on the verge of a yawn. “Another week of these ready-meals and I may resort to boiling my own shoes.”

“Ooooh, does this mean I can finally buy some salmon chips?” Rita says. She claps her hands to her cheeks. “Oh! And maybe some of taffy dot strips! And rice biscuits and gravy on a stick…”

As Rita rattles off the contents of her mental shopping cart, Juno sneaks a glance at Nureyev. To your casual observer he’d look…normal. Bored maybe—not a hair out of place.

It’s the atmosphere that gives him away. To survive his childhood, Juno was forced to become a sonar device. He learned to detect the smallest changes in his mother’s demeanor; posture; tone. Sarah could close a cabinet door a certain way and Juno would know to run for the sewers. His time with the police and as a detective only served to hone those skills. He can _feel_ tension in the air like a rabbit can sense a predator’s eyes. And even though Nureyev is giving off no visible signs of distress, Juno’s subconscious gadgetry is going haywire.

They can’t leave without attracting attention, though, so Juno only pokes at his food. He’s not great at play-pretend at the best of times; he can only hope his suspicious behavior keeps the spotlight off Nureyev.

Dinner drags on. Jet stands to clear his plate first. Nureyev follows at what feels like a calculated pace. Juno has to physically plant his hands on his legs to keep himself seated as his boyfriend leaves the room. He _cannot_ afford to chase after him like some terrified kid.

As Vespa crosses to the sink, Rita tugs on Juno’s sleeve.

“You ain’t thinkin’ of firin’ me any time soon, are ya’ boss?” she says. It would sound like tease to anyone but Juno, who covers the hand on his wrist.

“I wouldn’t worry, Rita,” he says. “See you tomorrow for breakfast, all right?”

“You’d better,” Rita warns. “Nobody’s gonna’ wanna’ miss Rita’s Waffles Wednesday!”

Juno is slightly terrified to find out what constitutes as waffles without access to flour, sugar, eggs or baking powder—but that’s a problem for future Juno’s stomach. Right now he gives Rita’s hand a single side-to-side shake and goes to clean his plate. The second it meets the drying rack, he’s out the door.

Nureyev’s not in their room.

It’s…common enough, for Nureyev to wander the ship at odd hours. He’s never been one for sitting still. Sometimes on the ‘Blanche Juno would find him doing work in the laundry room, or catch him asleep at the kitchen table. He once confessed to Juno that sleeping in the same bed for too many nights in a row felt dangerous.

So Juno decidedly _doesn’t_ panic and goes to search the rest of the ship.

They haven’t been here long enough for Nureyev to establish any favorite haunts, so Juno goes room to room. He’s lucky there aren’t very many. He checks the few scant hall closets; the engine room; the bathroom.

No luck. Juno starts to stumble after a while; his depth perception was shot _before_ the whole world turned the same ungodly shade of red. The night cycle lights make the search feel like some kind of neon nightmare.

Juno’s mind catches like cloth on a nail. He stops, hand pressed to the door pad outside the last hall closet.

Juno turns to the nearest hallway light. He stares at the sticky red glow, dispersed by a web of metal bars.

“Fuck,” he says. He checks the closet and starts back down the hall. He no longer bothers to disguise his urgency.

A full sweep of the ship confirms Juno’s worst fears; Nureyev isn’t just lounging around a new part of the ship. He’s actively hiding. 

This could be a problem. Before tonight, Nureyev has always shown up on his own accord. Juno has never had to _find_ him. Hell, he’s not sure that’s even possible. This man was already the master of disappearances by the time he was a teenager, and he’s only refined those skills over the past two decades. He doesn’t strike Juno as the type of guy to be found without his expressed permission.

Juno has never known when to give up, though. He combs the ship up and down—searches every room twice. Hovers outside the door to the second bedroom, ears peeled for Nureyev’s voice.

Nothing, nothing, nothing.

“Ransom!” Juno stage-whispers as he walks. He feels a bit like he’s looking for a missing cat. “Ransom? Are you there?”

Doors shut. Doors open. Empty.

“Ransom!”

The search goes on and on. The world blurs together under the glare of the night cycle lights. By Juno’s third pass of the ship, he’s nearly desperate enough to check the vents.

He’s far enough away from the bedrooms for no one else to hear, so Juno gives one last “Nureyevvvvv” to the empty hallway.

Surprise, surprise: nothing. Just the hum of the engine. Juno sighs hard enough to make his whole body slump. He turns back towards the electrical room.

Then he hears something. A shift, like the traction of a shoe against a metal floor. It’s barely audible over the sounds of the engine. In any other scenario Juno would’ve written it off as air hitting the vent slots at a weird angle.

Right now he knows better.

“Nureyev?” Juno whispers again. His heart has started to beat faster. He starts towards the noise at the far end of the hall.

Even with Nureyev’s clue—and it was a clue, Juno’s sure, because Nureyev never would’ve given himself away like that on accident—it takes some work to flush him out. Juno narrows down his search area to a stretch of hallway pillars—rectangular metal beams that line the ship’s hull like the ribs of a giant beast. Their shadows shouldn’t be big enough to hide a man as tall as Nureyev, but Juno sees no other option. The sound was too close to have come from a room away, and these shadows are the only place left to hide. Juno shines his comms light at each one.

First shadow: nothing.

Second shadow: nothing.

Third shadow: Nureyev. Juno nearly drops his comms at the sight of him. He’s squashed into the tiny alcove where a beam meets the ship wall. Whether to fit in the shadow or to soothe himself, his legs are pinned to his chest, his arms locked around his knees. He stares up at Juno like a criminal caught under a searchlight, so still Juno almost has to wonder whether he’s breathing.

Juno holds up his free hand—a gesture of peace. He thumbs off his comms light and pockets them. Slowly, he sinks to the floor.

“Nureyev,” he whispers. “Hey. You with me right now?”

Without the light from his comms Juno can barely make out Nureyev’s outline. The shape of him doesn’t so much as twitch. Juno might as well be talking to a shadow.

It’s not exactly an encouraging response, so Juno says, “You’re safe, okay? You’re on a stolen Dark Matters ship, with me and Rita and Jet and Vespa and Buddy. You’re gonna’ be fine.”

Still Nureyev doesn’t reply. A part of Juno is tempted to flash his light again just to make sure he’s still there.

“I’m gonna’ move closer,” Juno warns. “If that’s okay.”

When there’s only the expected silence, Juno nods to himself once. He unbends from his crouch enough to cross the last yard between him and Nureyev. He stops and sits, legs bent under him.

“Can I touch you, honey?” he asks hoarsely.

Nureyev draws his first audible breath since Juno found him. He reaches out, and his fingers catch the harsh red light.

Juno takes the hand. Nureyev makes a sound Juno’s never heard before—something fragile and _hurt_ —and a second hand comes up to grasp Juno’s. He can barely see Nureyev’s head bow forward.

“It’s okay,” Juno says. “It’s okay. Let’s…come on. You think we could go back to our room?”

Long seconds pass. Juno almost convinces himself Nureyev hadn’t heard. Then Nureyev lifts his left hand—the top one—off Juno’s. A finger traces the letters on the back of his hand:

YES

Juno’s chest twists up. He releases some of the tension with a kiss to Nureyev’s temple, then fumbles for his comms. “One sec.”

It’s more than a little difficult to text Rita one-handed, but Juno’s not about to let go of Nureyev. He taps out each letter with his thumb:

_sorry, rita. ransoms not doing so great. can we have the room for a while?_

He vows to make this up to Rita later—maybe with a movie night. Whatever she likes. For now, he knows Nureyev would hate to be seen like this.

Rita responds within seconds:

_SURE THING BOSS!! JUST TEXT WHEN I SHOULD COME BACK!!!_

Juno returns his comms to his coat pocket, relieved. “Room’s vacant,” he says. It’s the first time he’s spoken above a whisper; Juno feels Nureyev flinch. He lowers his voice: “Sorry. You ready to go?”

In answer, Nureyev bends one leg for leverage. As he climbs to his feet, he drops one hand from Juno’s. The other clings to his wrist, vice-like. Nureyev looks down the hallway—first one way, then the other. Then he and Juno peel away from the wall.

The two move back towards the bedrooms at a careful pace. Nureyev stays pressed to Juno’s side, alert for the smallest sign of danger. It becomes quickly apparent that their closeness is not for the sake of Nureyev’s comfort, but Juno’s protection.

“We’re on the ship, hon,” Juno murmurs periodically. “You’re having a flashback. We’re safe. It’s over.” He points out landmarks as they pass them—the doorway to the kitchen. The line of ducts over the electrical room. The sign Rita taped over the doorway to their shared bedroom. It doesn’t seem to help, but Juno suspects silence would make things even worse.

At last they enter their room. Juno smacks on the day cycle lights. Color springs to life out of the darkness, fast enough to make Juno reel. The second he’s acclimated, he steers Nureyev towards the bed.

“There,” he says as he sits him down. Nureyev’s hand slips through Juno’s; he reaches under the lip of the mattress and pulls out a knife. Juno didn’t know he’d stashed one there, but he can’t say he’s surprised. It doesn’t even cross his mind to be afraid. Nureyev wouldn’t hurt him.

Nureyev doesn’t get up from the bed, so Juno reaches behind him for their blanket. The weight might help ground him, or the heat. He tucks the edges over Nureyev’s bony shoulders. He looks at Nureyev, and Nureyev looks back. Juno can’t tell whether he seems more present now. He’s definitely still too pale.

Juno frowns. He’s lucky enough to have left a water canister beside the bed, stolen from the kitchen cupboards. The water’s surely warm by now, but Juno passes Nureyev the canister anyway. That’s what Rita used to do when he freaked out—make him drink water. It helped sometimes.

Nureyev accepts the canister with his free hand, though he doesn’t drink right away. He looks from Juno to Rita’s bed to the door.

Juno moves to sit beside Nureyev on the bed. He makes sure they’re close enough that Nureyev can feel him against his side. Juno’s comfort repertoire doesn’t extend very far beyond stream nights and hugs—the stuff Rita and Mick taught him over the years. He’s unmoored now, outside his established territory. He can only hope his proximity takes the edge off Nureyev’s anxiety.

It’s a small eternity before Nureyev moves again. He sets the knife down first—slowly, as though ordered to by an officer. Then he takes a swig of water. His hands were perfectly steady when Juno held them before, but now the canister shakes as he drinks.

Nureyev places the canister on the floor. Then he pitches forward and covers his mouth. Juno puts a hand on his back. He feels Nureyev’s muscles hitch through the blanket—a trademark of repressed sobs. He rubs a long stripe up and down his spine. Leans his head on his shoulder.

Juno has to at least try to make this better. It’s worth the possible missteps, to maybe provide Nureyev some modicum of comfort.

Nureyev doesn’t move away, so Juno doesn’t stop the slow sweep of his hand. A fan clicks to life overhead. The bathroom door opens and closes across the hall. If Nureyev does cry, he does so without a sound. Juno’s hand moves back and forth, back and forth.

In time Nureyev’s shoulders slump. His back muscles still under Juno’s hand.

The words come out cracked: “I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry for,” Juno says. It’s what Nureyev told him not two nights ago after a bad nightmare. His hand migrates up Nureyev’s back until he can cup the back of his neck.

Juno lets the moment sit for a second. Then he says, “Nureyev. We’re not going to Brahma.”

Nureyev scoffs. His hand moves from his mouth to cover his eyes; his glasses rest at a slant atop his fingers. “Unless you’ve found a way to transmute ration meals into rocket fuel, Juno, I’m afraid we don’t have much of a choice.”

Juno nudges him. “Hey. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, hon, but we’re living on a ship full of master criminals. You honestly think Buddy could figure out a plan to steal a miracle drug from the most well-guarded facility in the galaxy, but not a tank of fuel from some random swap moon?”

The hand trembles over Nureyev’s eyes. “It would still create an unnecessary risk.”

“And you going planetside wouldn’t?” Juno shifts his thumb. “You get spotted by a cop—a camera—whatever, we’ll be fucked.”

Nureyev looks down at the floor. He scrubs at his eyes, then removes his lopsided glasses. He plays with the temples as he says, “Buddy suspects.”

Juno lines his feet together on the floor so they’re perfectly parallel. He still hasn’t taken off his shoes. “Not by a lot. Otherwise she never would’ve even brought up that trip.”

“We’re in dire straits,” Nureyev reminds him. “It might be worth the risk to her, to purchase fuel quickly and without trouble. As long as I don’t leave the ship, we shouldn’t encounter resistance.”

“It’s less about ‘resistance’ and risk and more like she wouldn’t want to hurt you. People who like their home planets don’t pretend they’ve never been there; Buddy would probably assume you had a bad time on Brahma.” Juno clicks his teeth together a couple times. “Just…how about I go to Buddy and tell her I can’t go down there? If we _have_ to go to Brahma, then you and I can play hangman up here while Jet or whoever takes the car down. Buddy let Jet do the same thing on Neptune.”

Juno watches the temples of Peter’s glasses fold up and down, up and down. Then Peter tilts his head to rest atop Juno’s.

“She’ll know for certain then,” he says.

Juno sighs through his nose. “Probably.” A pause. “I’m so sorry.”

“Maybe it was inevitable.” Nureyev folds his glasses down one last time, then sets them down beside his knife on the bed. He turns enough to press a kiss to the side of Juno’s head. Juno reaches up. Their fingers find each other again. 

Nureyev laughs abruptly. It sounds wrong. "Do you know—I've never heard someone tell my story to me with such...creative license."

Juno can't begin to respond to that. It's too much. He squeezes Nureyev's hand. He can feel Nureyev start to relax. 

Then Nureyev says, 

“I wish I could face this."

Juno uses his free hand to move the blanket over both their shoulders. He wraps his arm around Nureyev’s back.

“It’s uh. It’s okay not to be ready, you know? It’s not like this stuff follows a schedule.” He clears his throat. “Nureyev. Do you… _want_ to go down to Brahma?”

For a while Nureyev seems to consider. Juno feels his chest expand and deflate against his side, slow and deliberate.

“I’m not sure,” he says. “It might not be a question of _want_ so much as _need._ ”

That at least Juno gets: the dilemma between safety and closure, with no solid line or metric to determine which counts as self care or self sabotage.

Maybe even to dock on Brahma would be enough for Peter, to prove to himself that he had survived his own legacy.

“Whatever you decide,” Juno tells him.

Juno hears Nureyev swallow. Then he ducks down and presses a long kiss to Juno’s collarbone.

“Thank you, Juno,” he says, with a weight that makes Juno’s heart skip a beat.

“No problem,” he manages. There are muffled footsteps as someone walks by outside—probably Jet, based on their speed and stride. Juno’s mind wanders to the hallway. He almost asks Nureyev whether they need to worry about the night cycle lights—but Nureyev feels limp as a flour sack against him, and Juno figures they can save that problem for tomorrow. “What do you…want right now?”

Nureyev’s head comes back up to rest on Juno’s shoulder. It can’t be comfortable—he has to lean down a ways to compensate for Juno’s height—but he doesn’t seem to mind. “I don’t want to shut Rita out for too long. I know you must have asked her to give us some space, for her to be out of the room. But…” he seems to search for the words, or maybe the courage to say them. “Could we…sit here, for a while longer? Like this?”

Juno brings their clasped hands to his chest. “Yeah, of course. Of course…”

Nureyev lets out a long breath. He turns his head a little on Juno’s shoulder.

Juno finds Nureyev’s wrist with his free hand. He taps him on a whim, softly and without rhythm, over and over.

 _I’m here,_ he means to say. _I’ll be right there next to you._

Nureyev hums at him. Juno can hear his smile.

**Author's Note:**

> A note about the red lights for anyone who's curious: Submarines use red night lighting because red light has a longer wavelength on the visual spectrum. Our eyes are less sensitive to longer wavelengths, so when going from pitch black (like the outside of a ship) to red light, they don't have to adjust like they would when going from pitch black to white light. It's all about preserving night vision for navigation/combat purposes.
> 
> I'm secretly a shy soul and don't often have the chutzpah to reply to comments, but I LOVE THEM and they totally make my day!!


End file.
